The Ghost of Christmas Presents
by beb
Summary: It's Christmas Eve and Valerie Gray has been issued a challenge - meet Danny Phantom in an old, abandoned house - if she dares!


The Window display played "Jingle Bells" nonstop, as it had for the last 28 days. Valerie Grey, at the end of a long day, was ready to stuff it whereever things like that were stuffed. But a job was a job and she was always in need of a second or even a third job. So she stood at the cash register asking "paper or plastic."

The clock on the register read 11:45. Another fifteen minutes. Then she'd be free! It had read 2 when she'd started that day. Ten hours and was Mr. Hill going to pay her overtime for the hours worked after eight? Of course not. We're all family here, he would say. Except she did all the work and he kept all the money. But this would be her last day here. Once the Christmas rush was over so was her job. For once she didn't mind. This had been a sucky job and the relentless jingling Christmas display had ruined Christmas for her, perhaps for the rest of her life!

"I'd like twenty of the "Millionaire Paradise" lottery tickets." an older man asked, laying a bill down on the counter. Valerie turned and unrolled twenty of the scratch off lottery tickets, handed them to the man and began ringing up his purchase.

"These Are '7G' tickets. I don't want them!" the man complained, thrusting back at Valerie. "I want the 8H tickets. All the prizes have all been claimed on the 7G tickets. I'm not stupid, I read that on the Internet. I want the 8H tickets."

"These are the only lottery tickets we have, sir"

"Well, I don't want then," the man yelled, throwing the heavy cardboard squares back into her face. He grab the twenty out of her hand and stalked out.

"Merry Christmas to you," Val grumbled, bending down to pick the tickets off the floor.

The next person in line, a large Black woman, piled a large assortment of plastic toys and wrapping paper on Valerie counter. She wore a cheap nurses' outfit that had been washed a million times. She looked, if anything more tired and harassed than Val. When Val had rung up her purchases the woman opened her purse and counted out a pile of crumbled bills, adding coins to make exact change. There wasn't much left over to put away.

Val punched in the amount tended and hit 'Cash' The register began printing out the woman's receipt while the cash drawer popped open, Val started to placed the money in the correct slots in the tray, then stopped. A Christmas card lay on top the slots. It was large and red and had her name written across it. It hadn't been there the last time the drawer had been open.

Valerie picked it up and looked it over. There was nothing unusual about it, except for having her name on it and being in a place it couldn't be.

She opened it and pulled out a card. It looked like one from this drugstore. There was a standard Santa on the cover climbing into a chimney. As trite and hokey a Christmas scene possible.

She opened the card.

It began playing a tinny version of "Jingle Bells." Valerie nearly freaked at the sound of the irritating song. Her fingers were set to crush the card into a ball when she noticed writing on the card. The inside message began:

_'Twas the Night Before Christmas_

_And all through the house_

_Not a Creature was stirring"_

_Not even a mouse_ "Except A GHOST..."

At the bottom of the card was some more writing. "Meet me at 1523 Hackworth - if you dare!"

There was no signature.

"Ahem!" Mr. Hill had come up next to Valerie. She was suddenly aware of the line of people waiting to be checked out. She jammed the card into the pocket of her work blouse and got to work, but her thoughts were on the card in her pocket.

It took more than 15 minutes to ring up all the customers in the store, a sad crew of last minute shoppers hoping to find something in a late-night drugstore that might be passed off as a gift of love and hope. But she had left as quickly as she could, ran back to the small apartment she and her parents lived in and from a concealed cache in her closet pull out the case. She didn't know who had left the case where she could find it, but was filled with the sorts of goodies an irate young girl would need to punish the ghost who had ruined her father's business and forced them to move into this run-down ghetto flat.

She quickly stripped and pulled on the orange colored jumpsuit with the most amazing gadgets built into it. She took a moment to extrude each weapon built into her costume and slipped reloads into their chambers. Softly she slip the window of her room open, crawled onto the sill and leaped out.

It was three stories to the frozen ground below but before she had dropped even a story her boots had extruded a large surf board like flight platform. She braked her fall, circled back up to her room and lowered the window. The cold air would bring her father looking for the cause. He had some time past forbidden her to use the battlesuit. Until Danny Phantom was destroy Valerie Gray had no intention of obeying.

Of course it had to be Danny Phantom who had slipped the card into her cash register. Only a ghost could have done it, moving invisibly and intangibly around or through her to slip an unseen note through solid metal into the drawer. She wasn't sure why he was taunting her tonight. She still have presents to wrap for her parents. Working three jobs during the Christmas season didn't leave much free time.

To Val, Danny Phantom was the source of all her misery. Her father had been a respected and successful security consultant, with an open-ended contract to guard Axiom Labs but Danny Phantom had come through and destroyed the place. Val's father had been sued for the damages, which had wiped him out. What Val didn't know was that Danny had been trying to restrain an enormous ghost dog, part of an earlier security operation, who had returned for his puppyhood chew toy. Danny had been trying to prevent the damage that had occurred. Sadly, Val had never seen any of that and it was far to late for Danny to try to explain.

Hackworth Street wound along a bluff overlooking Lake Eerie. Once, during the Gilded Age, it had been the home for countless Amity Park millionaires. But the Great Depression had sweep through Hackworth Street like the Plague through London. All that was left was a series of large, rambling Victorian mansions, each more grand then the last, slowly rotten, caving in on themselves.

A light snow was falling when Val finally found number 1523. The weed-choked, over-ground lawns were coated in white while the streets and sidewalks remained wet and dark. The houses, covered with a thin layer of snow looked like a Christmas card, pretty and peaceful. If Christmas were more like this, Val thought, and less like Hall's Drugstore she'd feel a whole lot better about the season.

The jetboard had automatically retracted when she had come in for a landing. It was like stepping off an escalator. One moment she was standing still, zooming at a great rate through the skies, the next she was stepping through the gate into the front yard of the building. The jetboard gave her incredible maneuverability and speed, the match of any ghost, inside the old mansion it would be too cramped to use. But she trained every night when she could and the suit had a built-in exoskeleton. Nothing Iron Man-like - though that would be a great suit to have for battling ghosts - but adequate enough. Fighting this ghost inside this old house would be a piece of cake.

The porch creaked ominously as she climbed it but continued to support her weight. The front door, through, had been kicked in at some time and lay in a pile in the small vestibule inside. Valerie stepped over the broke-up door into a small hall beyond. It was dark in here, shut off from the wane moon outside. Val decided to turn on her helmet flashlight. The ghost, she figured it to be Danny Phantom, could see in the dark but she couldn't. She figured he had laid out some traps to trip her up. She needed the light to avoid them.

She was just tapping the button on her wrist controls when the ghost whizzed past her, throwing confetti in her face and slapping her on the back. Val spun, triggering her gun and fired four rounds after him. But she was too slow. The blaster blew holes in the wall behind the ghost but never quite caught up with him.

The confetti had been a distraction of some sort since she still had the faceplate of her helmet closed. The pat on her back! What had he put there? Val reached around and fumbled around her back until she found a small piece of cardboard, a 3 by 5 file card (pack of 100, 99 cents her mind recalled). On it was written: "Tag - you're it!"

"You think this is some kind of game?" Valerie shouted. "I'll kick your butt so hard the only games you'll be playing are standing up!"

Val crushed the card in her hand and threw it to the floor. She stepped farther into the hall and snagged her foot on a piece of string. Across the hall and near some stairs a plastic snowman lit up. It was about a foot high with the tradition corncob pipe, black eyes and stovepipe hat. A sound chip inside began playing "Frosty the Snowman." Val recognized the snowman as one from Hall's Drugstore. ($3.99 plus tax). All day long kids would push the 'play me' button. Again and again... Val shot it with her blaster. It blew up wonderfully.

But the blast seem to trigger another snowman further back in the hall. This one was two feet tall and added jiggling bells as a background to 'Frosty the Snowman.' She blew it up as well.

And that activated a third snowman, an inflatable one nearly six feet tall, with interior lights and waving arm action. "It went "Ho ho ho" instead of playing the song. Another Hill Drugstore special, $13.95, air pump not included. "Gah! she hissed and shot it as well. The snowman exploded with a sharp bang! and some bright yellow flames. Someone must have inflated it with natural gas, she guessed. Pissed at the thought that Danny Phantom was playing with her, Val shot up the back of the hall. She felt good about that.

Seeing that she'd blown down a door leading into a large room, Val decided to pass on the living room that opened off the hallway to the right, figuring that Danny was expecting her to go there next and had it booby-trapped. Take him by surprise was what she thought,.

She doused her helmet light and crept up to the shattered door, carefully stepping over the pieces. Sure enough she could see a bit of Danny Phantom hovering in the doorway that lead into the next room. Light from a series of large windows revealed built-in cabinets suggesting that this had been the dining room. Val was coming in from a door off the front hall while Danny was hiding in a doorway coming in from the living room. The room he expected Val to appear in next. At the other end of the room was another door, leading off into the kitchen she supposed.

All she could see of Danny was a bit of his back. That wasn't enough to insure that she killed him and kill him was her life's goal. She stepped further into the room to get a better shot but as she did so one of the floorboard creaked. Her arm flung up and a volley of shots rang out but Danny was already on the move. Still it looked that one shot that had blown a large chunk out of the doorway frame and singed the ghost boy's arm.

Val ran forward and peered into the next room. She could see Danny lying on the floor, holding on to one arm.

"Gotcha, ya bastard!" She shouted and started to aim for the kill-shot. Danny flung some ectoplasm her way and scrambled to his feet. He ran through the archway into the hall and out of Val's sight. He was running off-balance because he was still holding on to his injured arm. Having had to duck Danny ectoplasm Val next shots smashed wildly into the wallpaper in the living room.

She scrambled after him, forgetting for the moment about the booby-traps Danny had left behind. She tripped over another length of string, which activated a large plastic Santa who light up with an interior light, started waving one arm and chanting "Ho ho ho! Merry Christmas!" ($49.95 with $5 manufacturers instant rebate she recalled. Also the motor in the arm was defective causing a fifty percent return rate. God, she hated handling returns!) She blew off it's head with one shot, then had to use two more to smash the sound chip that refused to die with the rest of the Santa.

Just to be safe Val toggled on her helmet light and spotted three more Santas in varying sizes. She blasted them as well, then raced after the ghost. They were all from Hall's Drugstore and seeing them explode brought a feral grin to her lips. How did that old TV show go? "They blowed up real good!"

Val crossed the hall into a smaller room, a sitting room, with a large fireplace and a door into the dining room. The fireplace looked cold and damp and was filled with a fair amount of debris and ashes. Homeless people, she realized, must have come in here from time to time and built a fire to warm up. Above the fireplace was a large rectangle of darker wallpaper where some large painting once hung. In its place was a plastic wreath with bits of bright red holly stuck into it ($15.87 with - uh-oh - motion detection play!) Before Val had a chance to back away the wreath began playing "We wish you a Merry Christmas."

The wreath proved invulnerable to her blaster, it's structure too loose and interwoven to be easily destroyed. Val hopped up and expanded her jetboard to reach the wreath and yank it down. She tossed it on the floor and stomped on it until the sound chip and been smashed. She was panting with rage and frustration about them, when Danny popped his head through the doorway and said, "clean up in aisle seven."

He ducked back out of the room before she could fire at him, and raced up the stairs. Val pounded behind him.

The top of the stairs was dark. The only window being at the far end of the hall. Another, narrower flight of stairs lead up to the attic and, Val guessed, the servant's quarters. There was no sight of Danny Phantom. Had he gone all the way up into the attic, she wondered. If he did he was waiting for her up there and could wait a while longer.

Val opened the first door after the landing. It was a small bedroom of some sort, with no built-in closets. She went in to make sure Danny wasn't hiding somewhere. When she came out a herd of deer were charging at her. She leaped into the air, extending her jetboard to rise over the head of the deer. They crashed into the wall behind her with a rattling, plastic sound. She turned briefly and saw they were plastic deer, roped together and mounted on casters.

Still on her jetboard, Val flew down the length of the hall, firing rounds into each of the room as she passed them. There was no yelp from Danny from any of the rooms. Val cursed. How do you fight a ghost that can phase through walls?

She was turning around to fly back the length of the hall when another motion activited Christmas display lit up. On the floor at the end of the hall, under the small winder there, was a creche, with baby Jesus, Mary, Joseph, some lambs and blow-up camels. She flew close so see what was up with this, and that started the baby Jesus to cry out "Don't shot! I'm unarmed!"

Val leveled the blaster mounted on her arm at the creche, then lowered it again. What kind of crazy ghost was she chasing? The idea of adding a recordable sound chip to the manager with a silly message like that. He was mocking her. Mocking her!

From the other end of the hall she heard a "yoo hoo" and turned to see Danny Phantom, wearing a red Santa's hat, with his thumbs in his ears, waving his hands at her and sticking out his tongue. Val fired so fast that Danny leaped back into the room he had come out of with an audible "Yipes!"

Val rockets down the length of the hall and peppered the room with more blaster fire before gliding in to see if she had hit Danny.

He was lying on the floor, writhering in pain, clutching the shoulder she had hit earlier. "Darn," he was cursing. When he saw Val gliding into the room he said something stronger and phased through the wall into the air outside.

Val crouched down on her board and smashed through the window. She could see Danny Phantom flying off in the distance. With some room to work in she cranked up the speed on the jetboard until she could hear the air whipping past her helmeted face.

She kept up a round of blaster fire but Danny kept jinking right and left so she could never get a slid shot in.

They sped across town that way. Danny would occasionally try to lose her by sweeping in and around various skyscrapers but Val would always catch up with him. He tried loosing her in the low-level maze of traffic lights, street lights and Christmas decorations but she matched him move for move. And slowly she was gaining on him.

Finally he took to the skies again and struck a beeline for the city's western boundary. He faded from sight as he crossed the line. It didn't look like he was slowing down as he disappeared. Val pulled up at the city limits and pulled a scan with her long distance ectoplasmic radar. It couldn't pick up any evidence of a ghost.

"You better run!" she called out in the sky. "And you'd better keep running or I'll kick your butt again. I'll kick your butt so hard they can - uh - take plaster casts of my shoes off'n your butt!"

She waited for a long minute for Danny to reply. When he didn't she figured she's run him off for good. She turned her jetboard around and cruised back towards the apartment she and her father shared.

She dropped to the ground a couple blocks from the apartment and started walking. She popped open the faceplace so she could feel the air on her face. Her fight with Danny Phantom had worked up quite a sweat and the cold air was refreshing.

It was still snowing. There was and inch or more on the ground. The flakes were big and fluffy, falling in lazy swirling through the street lights. The city was supernaturally quiet, muffled in the descending snow.

From time to time she's pause to stretch the muscles on her back, remembering that she'd worked twelves earlier at Hill's before her fight. It had been a long, long day. She was ready for a hot shower and long nap in bed. Or maybe just the long nap. The shower could wait till morning. She found herself humming "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen." her emphasis was on the 'rest' part but for the first time in a month she didn't mind the Christmasy song.

After a quick look around to be sure no one was looking, Val hopped up and extended her jetboard and floated up to her bedroom window. She reached out to throw up the sash when she noticed a green envelope propped against the glass. She scowled at what was obviously another challenge from her nemesis. What did Phantom has to say this time?

She tore the envelope open and pulled out the card. The outside of the card was underplayed, minimalist. It showed an upside down "V" for a shed, some round humps for hills with stick-figure trees. A single star in the heavens send down a beam to the shelter but there were no lowing sheep, restless shepherds or wandering Magi. There was no Madonna or Child. Just a ray of light in the night.

She could feel the lump of a sound chip and braced herself for whatever horrid sound it would play but was surprised to hear the rich, brown tone of Louie Armstrong song "I've seen trees ... of green..."

Valerie wasn't a fan of Louie Armstrong. He was much too old for her. But her father loved him and she had heard this song played many times. "What A Wonderful World."

She listened to it for a moment before looking to see what else was on the card. It was one of those cards sold with a blank interior so you could write your own sentiment. In a sprawling, almost indecipherable hand she read:

_Val -_

_Hope you enjoyed your Christmas Present. _

_Your enemy, _

_Danny Phantom._

_ps - next year - the gloves are off._

"You bastard! She screamed. "I'll get you yet. And it won't take till Christmas! You hear me? The gloves were never on!"

She pushed her window down and ducking down slide inside and quietly lowered the sash. She throw the card on her bed as she changed clothes and hung the battlesuit up to air. It would be nice if she would wash it once in a while but didn't dare because of all the circuitry inside. The best she could do was Febreeze it.

Dressed in warm pajamas Val was about to throw back the blankets when she saw the card again. She was about to tear it up into bits, then looked at the nightstand where all her other Christmas cards were on display. One from an aunt she barely knew and one from a charity she occasionally gave to. "Well, he did give me a good time tonight. And took my mind off how miserable I felt." She laid the card flat on the nightstand so it wouldn't continue to play. "Ok, just this one time, Merry Christmas, Danny Phantom. But the day after tomorrow - it's war!"


End file.
